Sherr, who began teaching at Georgetown University as a computer science assistant professor in August, talks about online privacy and the growth of computer science. A Georgetown computer science doctorate program will begin in fall 2011.
What does your research focus on?
I’m interested in security and privacy. In particular, what I would call privacy-enhancing technologies. So, these are systems that enable you to use the Web without being surveilled, which is important if you don’t want your children to be tracked by advertisers, for example, or if you’re a whistle-blower for a company… My research investigates tools and techniques for accessing information in a way that conceals the fact that you’re actually accessing that information.
Why is online privacy so important?
Human beings wouldn’t generally publicly advertise the information that they’re looking up on the Internet, yet the current Internet infrastructure enables people with even a very limited knowledge of computers the ability to eavesdrop on communication… Having the ability to access information in an anonymous way is extremely important for personal privacy and generally for democracy.
Why is computer science a growing interest among college students?
I think now there are a lot of companies out there that are looking for computer science skills, and even companies that aren’t necessarily computer science companies are looking for people who are confident computer programmers. So I think that computer science is becoming much more interdisciplinary, and there are a growing number of industries that are interested in hiring people who are knowledgeable about computer science.
What’s a common misconception about Internet security?
That it’s easy to get right. A computer scientist of discipline doesn’t know how to build secure systems and it’s something that we’re actively working on but we’re far away from figuring out.
Anna Waugh
